Manager - IT Solutions Architecture

JOB SUMMARY

The Manager of IT Solutions Architecture leads the team responsible for how technology solutions are designed, integrated, and delivered. The role is hands-on: setting technical direction, enforcing architecture standards, and staying close enough to the work to review designs and make defensible trade-offs. It is equally a people role—hiring and developing architects, managing performance, balancing workload across project delivery, operations, training, and time off, and producing the monthly capacity forecast that project planning depends on. The manager partners daily with cybersecurity, enterprise architecture, project management, IT operations, and DevOps. The strongest candidates bring depth in several technical domains, familiarity across the rest, and a track record of growing people and leading through influence.

JOB DUTIES

• Lead, coach, and develop a team of application and solution architects—hiring, onboarding, performance management, career development, and cross-training.
• Build the monthly capacity forecast projecting each architect’s time across projects, operations, training, and time off, and provide it to the project team for capacity planning.
• Assign and balance work across the team, resolve competing project and operational demands, and escalate when demand exceeds capacity.
• Lead the evolution of the IT solutions architecture function—its processes, deliverables, governance, and standards.
• Contribute to ERCOT’s IT strategic plan and translate it into actionable architecture roadmaps.
• Assess the current IT environment for deficiencies, technical debt, and risk, and recommend prioritized remediation.
• Oversee the technical and business roadmaps, reference architectures, and design deliverables the team produces.
• Review and approve solution designs for alignment with enterprise architecture, security, and operational supportability.
• Direct the standards-setting process, lead the architecture standards committee, and maintain the principles governing technology investment.
• Evaluate emerging technologies, including AI and cloud, and set practical guardrails for the team’s use of AI-assisted tooling.
• Partner with cybersecurity, enterprise architecture, the project team, IT operations, and DevOps on security requirements, enterprise alignment, resource planning, and supportable designs.
• Develop vendor strategies, contribute to build versus buy decisions, and provide input to departmental budgeting.

SKILLS & EXPERIENCE

Technical Expertise

• Minimum 8 years of job-related work experience and 2 years in a leadership role in excess of degree requirements. Minimum years of job-related experience can include time in leadership roles.
• Experience in at least two IT disciplines—such as solution architecture, application development, data management, or IT operations—supporting a 24x7 environment.
• Strong foundation in application and integration architecture, distributed systems, and API design.
• Hands-on experience designing or operating workloads in a major public cloud.
• Working knowledge of identity and access management, DevOps, CI/CD, Infrastructure-as-Code, observability, and AI-assisted development tools.
• Working understanding of security architecture, networking, and governance frameworks, and how compliance obligations shape design decisions.
• Depth to review designs critically and arbitrate technical disagreements, plus experience establishing architecture standards and driving adoption.

Leadership & Collaboration

• Proven experience leading a technical team, including hiring, coaching, performance management, and career development.
• Track record of building capacity forecasts and using them to set realistic commitments.
• Ability to balance competing priorities across projects and operations, and renegotiate scope with clear reasoning.
• Skill in developing people—growth plans and cross-training so knowledge is not concentrated in one person.
• Ability to lead through influence, give direct feedback, and handle difficult conversations with candor.
• Strong communication, with proven partnership across cybersecurity, enterprise architecture, project management, IT operations, and DevOps, and credibility with IT and business leadership.

QUALIFICATIONS

• Hands-on experience with cloud architecture and governance at enterprise scale, preferably Azure. Relevant cloud certifications are a plus.
• Experience introducing AI capabilities and AI-assisted tooling into an engineering organization.
• Experience in grid, market, or transmission operations, at an ISO/RTO, or applying NERC CIP to solution design.
• Background in enterprise transformation, modernization, or platform engineering programs.

EDUCATION

• Bachelor’s Degree: Computer Science, MIS or related field (Required)
• Master’s Degree: Computer Science, MIS or related field (Preferred)
• or a combination of education and experience that provides equivalent knowledge to a major in such fields is required

CERTIFICATION

• CISSP Certified Information Systems Security Professional (Preferred)
• PMP Project Management Professional (Preferred)
• TOGAF (Preferred)

WORK LOCATION

• Hybrid in Taylor, TX 2 days per week

The foregoing description reflects the minimum qualifications and the essential functions of the position that must be performed proficiently with or without reasonable accommodation for individuals with disabilities. It is not an exhaustive list of the duties expected to be performed, and management may, at its discretion, revise or require that other or different tasks be performed as assigned. This job description is not intended to create a contract of employment with ERCOT. Both ERCOT and the employee may exercise their employment-at-will rights at any time. #LI-DN

ERCOT is firmly committed to equal employment for all qualified persons without regard to race, sex, medical condition, religion, age, creed, national origin, citizenship status, marital status, sexual orientation, physical or mental disability, ancestry, veteran status, genetic information or any other protected category under federal, state or local law.

Expected Salary Range: